Drivers Control

[MichaelBick]

We really loved our gamepad + joystick setup this year. The gamepad was used by the driver. Our main driver this year preferred tank drive, I prefer cheesy drive. While I find that cheesy allows most people to perform better, it really depends on your driver. Also we tried xbox controllers last year but we prefer the gamepads because the joysticks are located right next to each other.

The operator controls really can vary year to year. We've used a logitech joystick for the past few years because we haven't needed anything else. Ideally we would have custom buttons for each year, but we don't have enough manpower to design and build a control board each year. For now, if we ever run into a situation where we need more buttons/joysticks we will likely use an xbox controller/gamepad.

[ekapalka]

Well... it's pretty hard to beat this as far as controllers go. It made our robot look about twice as awesome as it really was :D It's plug & play :P

[Ipiano]

I've only been on my team 2 years, but as the lead programmer, I've set up a number of different controls systems for our team to use. We've tried the following for driving:

Two logitech joysticks for tank-drive
One logitech joystick arcade style using the x axis(left to right)
One logitech 3D joystick arcade style using the z axis(twist)
One Xbox controller

In addition, we used the throttle lever at the bottom of the joystick to throttle the maximum speed up and down, and we used a side thumb button to invert driving, when the robot was turned around.

The result was that our drivers(and myself) preferred using a the logitech 3D joystick to drive arcade style using the z axis to turn, and we used a second logitech joystick to control various other functions on the robot including our shooter(2012) and our climbing mechanism(2013)

[flameout]

2008: This was before my year, but in 2008, 957 used a steering wheel and two beige kit joysticks. The robot had ackermann steering, so the steering wheel controlled the angle of the front wheels. The joystick controlled the left and right drive motors. It did not work very well...

2009: Since we had a crab-drive robot that didn't work very well, I don't recall what we used (it may have had 2 modes, but I'm not sure).

2010 and 2011: Standard tank drive with 2 kit joysticks
T-shirt launcher: Also standard tank drive, but the older beige (pre-2009) kit joysticks

2012 and 2013: Mecanum drive with 2 kit joysticks

Here's the setup we use for mecanum (someone mentioned it in a thread several years ago, but I can't find it):

Linear motion was controlled by the average position of the two joysticks
Rotation was controlled by the difference in the Y axes of the joysticks

In essence, if you move the joysticks "together" (keep them in identical positions), you get only translational motion. If you move one forward and one backwards (as you would when turning a tank drive robot), you cause the robot to turn.

In 2012, I did some testing to compare this setup with using a single 3-axis (four if you count the throttle) joystick, and found that it gives you more control and precision than a single joystick. With a single joystick, it was easy to mix up the lateral and translational axes and there was limited precision in rotational control.

[raphaelchang]

Starting in 2013, 846 has a been using a steering wheel for turning and a joystick for throttle. We tried out the idea after seeing 971 use a steering wheel setup. Having the turn and throttle components on separate controls allows us to drive straight and turn in place more easily, and it also allows better control of arc turning (turning while driving forwards/backwards).

We found this as the optimal driving scheme after experimenting with several other setups as well:
2011-2012 - Single joystick for forward and turn, forward and back motion for throttle, joystick twist for turn. This made arc turning difficult because both motions were controlled with one hand. Turning in general was also difficult because the twist was more sensitive and turning with the wrist was more difficult to control precisely.
Off-season - We also tried two other setups during off-season, tank drive and vector drive. Tank drive used two joysticks, one to control the left side and one to control the right side. This made the driving feel more natural, but it also made precise control difficult. Driving straight was difficult and precise turning speed was hard to control. Vector drive used the angle of the joystick to specify the direction of the robot and the magnitude to control the speed. The robot would turn automatically to face the angle pointed by the joystick and move forward at that speed. Although this field-centric setup made it easier to go the direction we wanted, it was difficult to control for tight manipulations.

[Walter Deitzler]

Originally Posted by raphaelchang

Starting in 2013, 846 has a been using a steering wheel for turning and a joystick for throttle. Having the turn and throttle components on separate controls allows us to drive straight and turn in place more easily, and it also allows better control of arc turning (turning while driving forwards/backwards).

We found this as the optimal driving scheme after experimenting with several other setups as well:
2011-2012 - Single joystick for forward and turn, forward and back motion for throttle, joystick twist for turn. This made arc turning difficult because both motions were controlled with one hand. Turning in general was also difficult because the twist was more sensitive and turning with the wrist was more difficult to control precisely.
Off-season - We also tried two other setups during off-season, tank drive and vector drive. Tank drive used two joysticks, one to control the left side and one to control the right side. This made the driving feel more natural, but it also made precise control difficult. Driving straight was difficult and precise turning speed was hard to control. Vector drive used the angle of the joystick to specify the direction of the robot and the magnitude to control the speed. The robot would turn automatically to face the angle pointed by the joystick and move forward at that speed. Although this field-centric setup made it easier to go the direction we wanted, it was difficult to control for tight manipulations.

Any chance you could post the model of steering wheel?

[raphaelchang]

We use a Ferrari GT Racing Wheel for our steering wheel. It can be found here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000U1MU2K/sr=1-1/qid=1357360819/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&qid=1357360819 &seller=&sr=1-1

[Gabrielle62]

For the past few year 2994 has used 1 or 2 logitech joysticks depending on if the driver preferred tank or arcade drive and then a logitech gamepad for everything else (this year the mini joysticks for rotating the arm and the buttons for shooting, and last year the same buttons for shooting).

[robowrestler]

2011- cyborgx joystick arcade drive style on a west coast drive

2010/2012- cyborgx joystick on a mechanum drive also arcade style

2013- xbox controller with an arcade style drive on the a modified kit bot chassis

my favorite was the xbox controller it was a lot more comfortable to drive with and the co-driver also had one controlling the shooter

[ErvinI]

From what I know, which may not be correct outside of 2012 and 2013:

Main Driver:

• 2010: One Joystick. Either Attack 3 or Attack 3D. Arcade Drive variant where rotation was done through two buttons on top of the joystick (our programmer was new that year ).
• 2011: Tank Drive with two Attack 3 Joysticks.
• 2012: Tank Drive with two Attack 3 Joysticks.
• 2013: Tank Drive with two Attack 3 Joysticks (I see a pattern here...)

Driver preference tends to be key. Our drivers have often times preferred tank drive over Arcade/ Kaj Drive because they like the ability to reduce the power going to one wheel independently from the other wheel. For some drivers this is difficult to master, however it works great for precision steering if trained properly.

[Iaquinto.Joe]

2011: We used 1 Logitech controller for arcade drive, and a custom board for positioning the arm. It had a "Mini me" version of our arm with potentiometers and correct arm segment lengths that we used for custom positioning. It also had buttons in a layout for the drivers to press, along with sweep and station, and "Barf and flip", which was used for clearing the tubes.

2012: 1 xbox controller for octocanum control. Also controlled bride manipulator. 1 logitech for turret, intake, and firing control.

2013: 1 flight controller, 1 logitech. The flight controller had a constant rate throttle, and an arcade joystick for turning. Also controlled hanging. Logitech controlled all disk handling and lateral aiming, in addition to firing.

[alex.lew]

We have used a Logitech joystick for arcade drive for the past two years, our driver preferred that over 2 joysticks for tank. We use the eStop Robotics Custom Control Interface (CCI) as a button board. It opens as another joystick in code and is very easy to set up and maintain, total cost of only $40. You can add pretty much any button / potentiometer / switch you want. We had a "big red FIRE button" to control our shooter and was directly cited in our Quality Award at Razorback Regional.
Plus it's really fun to show kids at demos

[z_beeblebrox]

This year, we used the circuit board from a Logitech gamepad to run a modified pistol-grip RC car controller for the driver and a custom control box for the operator.

This system worked very well for letting the drivers control the robot, but we had some trouble with the gamepad electronics, since they're really designed to control a gamepad and nothing else. Next year, we'll probably use the pistol grip controller again, but with something like the eStop Custom Control Interface instead.

[cbale2000]

From what I can remember from my time on my team, we've used these control setups for driving our robots...

• 2006: Tank Drive - 2 Joysticks (the old, black Flight Stick controllers) for driving, plus one custom 4-button control box for switching between collection/shooting modes.
• 2007-2008: Tank Drive - 2 FS Joysticks for driving, plus 2 additional joysticks for other robot functions.
• 2009-2010: Tank Drive - 2 Logitech Attack 3 Joysticks for driving,
• 2011: Tank Drive - 1 Logitech (PS3) Gamepad for driving, modified NES controller for the robots arm (Robot was reprogrammed after the season to require only the one Logitech Gamepad to control all functions, minus gear shifting, which was disabled).
• 2012-2013: Tank Drive - 1 Logitech (PS3) Gamepad for driving and other functions, no other controllers.

Having been a robot driver from 2006-2008, and, as a mentor, having also been able to occasionally drive every robot since then, I must say I'm still partial to older dual-joystick controls. You just don't seem to get the same resolution in the controls with the newer gamepads like you did with those old Flight Sticks. But that's my 2 cents at least.

[Oak1477]

This year our team used a modified rc controller for the driving aspect and for the shooting we used an xbox 360 controller.

The rc remote was Spektrum dx2e that we gutted (except for the power switch and the potentiometers) and put an Arduino uno in that we porgrammed to act as a logitech joystick.

Our team lets the drivers choose the controller they want to use. We believe if the driver is comfortable with the controller they will perform better.